Sinergie-SIMA 2022 Management Conference Electronic Conference Proceedings Boosting knowledge & trust for a sustainable business ISBN 97888947136-0-2 30 June – 1 July 2022 – Bocconi University of Milan (Italy) DOI 10.7433/SRECP.EA.2022.01 105 The business model transition toward sustainability A case of an Italian firm operating in the energy industry NUNZIA CAPOBIANCO * VINCENZO BASILE  Framing of the research. New Business Models (BMs) are commonly proposed as one of the key solutions but are mostly investigated in general terms, without elaborating on or systematically analyzing how these new BMs are linked to specific mitigation measures or transition strategies. Business Model Innovation (BMI) is increasingly necessary for the transition to a sustainable energy system. As government officials, policymakers, and the general public increasingly express their concern about global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions, scientists search for alternative sources of energy. The further growth in the Renewable Energy Sources (RES) sector is in line with the European Union’s choice to make the decarbonization of the economy the distinctive development model in the global competition in this century. The president of the Italian Council of Ministers, Mario Draghi, in his recent speech underlined the importance of renewable sources and the limits they find to adoption in the bureaucratic machine. Faced with the gas crisis that Italy and all of Europe are experiencing, the premier said, “the most valid answer in the long term is to proceed quickly, as we are doing, in the direction of greater development of renewable sources, also and above all with a greater simplification of the procedures for installing systems”. Because this is of one of the historical problems of our country: the red tape. There is a global goal to reduce carbon emissions and create a more sustainable world. Over the past decades, a growing share of renewable energy resources has been developed to reach this goal. Therefore, the obstacles to speed are not merely technical or technological but above all bureaucratic. Therefore, new management skills should be created, and new business models developed that exploit innovative technologies and a simplified bureaucracy. In recent years, the studies of BMI impacts on Sustainability and Circular Economy (CE) have been issues much debated in the literature (Basile and Vona, 2021; Daou et al., 2020, Pieroni et al., 2019). Moreover, the sustainable development enhanced by the Green Economy (GE), and Blue Growth (BG) in the broader framework of smart and disruptive technologies represents a huge opportunity for creating value with the reconfiguration of own business model. The academic and practitioner interest in Sustainable Business Models (SBMs) has grown rapidly. SBMs incorporate sustainability as an integral part of the firm’s value proposition and value creation logic. Business Models (BMs) for Sustainability provide value to the customer and the natural environment and society (Abdelkafi and Tauscher, 2016). SBM aim to provide products or services that directly or indirectly reduce the pressure on society and the environment while still generating profits equal to or greater than traditional business (Bocken and Short, 2016, Bohnsack et al., 2014, Chun and Lee, 2013). SBM represent a mediating device for implementing a strategy aiming at the business case for sustainability and creating a fit between different areas of a firm and its business environment as well as social actors (Schaltegger et al., 2012; Ludeke-Freund, 2020). Schaltegger et al. (2012) identified three typologies of business model innovations: defensive, accommodative, and proactive. Defensive strategies consist of business model adjustment to safeguard the existing business model through risk and cost reduction measures according to a compliance perspective. Accommodative strategies require the implementation of some improvements and integrations of the current business model by considering environmental and social issues. Proactive strategies pursue the redesign of the business model according to sustainability principles. Highly polluting industries are under increasing pressure from authorities as the cost of CO2 emissions rises, incentivizing the shift to low-carbon solutions. The energy industry is one of the protagonists of the transition phenomenon, involving players both in the “pure” energy industry and in the utility one. The energy transition is a pathway toward the transformation of the global energy industry from fossil-based to zero-carbon by the second half of this century. At its heart is the need to reduce energy-related CO2 emissions to limit climate change. Decarbonization of the energy industry requires urgent action on a global scale, and while a global energy transition is underway, further action is needed to reduce carbon emissions and mitigate the effects of climate change. In this context, companies need to rethink their business models (BMs) in terms of sustainability. As BM corresponds to the ways companies adopt to improve market performance based on new ideas and technologies (Chesbrough, 2010; Teece, 2010). To understand the policy implications of Business Model Innovation (BMI) in energy markets, system-specific accounts are needed, which link the Sustainable Business Model Innovation (SBMI) literature (Geissdoerfer et al., 2018), to empirical cases and reduce the * Research Fellow in Management - Federico II University of Naples, Italy e-mail: nancy.capobianco@unina.it.  Assistant Professor in Economics and Business Management - Federico II University of Naples, Italy e-mail: vincenzo.basile2@unina.it.